1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information providing system and an information providing apparatus for mobile objects. More particularly, the present invention relates to an information providing system for mobile objects, which is configured so as to change information to be provided to each user (mobile object) according to starting and destination points of a route on which the user is moving or the route type.
2. Description of Related Art
Now that on-vehicle information terminals, typically car navigation systems, as well as portable telephones provided with the GPS respectively have come into wide use, various apparatuses that move with the users (mobile objects) and provide the users with various helpful information are spreading rapidly.
So far, those apparatuses have never gone beyond displaying the current spot and/or route on a map while searching and displaying information of near-by shops and stores existing along the route on which the user is moving. In the near future, however, the users will come to expect more enhanced apparatuses with which the users can get much more information using communication functions.
Under such circumstances, there have been many inventions proposed for providing such information providing apparatuses that have various functions. For example, one of those functions provided for such an apparatus is used to store and manage information of favorite items of respective users beforehand in the information providing center that functions as a source of various information items to be provided to users, thereby those information items are customized according to the information of each user""s stored favorite items upon a request from the user (ex., the patent document 1). There is also another function for recording the moving history of each user, thereby the user is provided with information related to his/her desired place/facility with priority, obtained from the moving history of a different user who has already visited the place/facility and his/her moving history is similar to that of the former user (ex., the patent document 2).
There is still another function for recording how many users have accessed each provided information menu so as to provide each user with frequently used information menus with priority, thereby improving the convenience of the user (the patent document 3). There is also still another function for recording the moving history of each mobile object to estimate the next destination according to the recorded moving history so as to provide the user of the mobile object with its related information. And, there is also still another function for extracting such information as an area in which a user moves frequently, for example, a place where the user stays for a long time, from his/her moving history so that the user is to be provided with information related to the area/place (ex., the patent document 4). 
[Patent document 1] Official gazette of JP-A No. 132645/2002
[Patent document 2] Official gazette of JP-A No. 140362/2002
[Patent document 3] Official gazette of JP-A No. 202373/2001
[Patent document 4] Official gazette of JP-A No. 324246/2000
If a user moves from a place to another, what information the user is to need depends significantly on why the user is moving on the route in addition to the information of places around the route itself. This is because it often occurs that what information the user requires during the moving on a route comes to differ between when the user is going to go to work in the morning of a week day and when the user enjoys driving on a holiday.
However, no conventional technique has been developed so far to cope with such a difference between the two occasions by providing each user with different information items according to the moving purpose of the user.
According to the invention described in the patent document 1, the user is requested to register information of his/her favorite items beforehand. Therefore, the user is requested to update his/her favorite item information each time the user has a different moving purpose from the purposes in the past. This has been troublesome and inconvenient for the user.
According to the invention described in the patent document 3, in which the user is provided with frequently accessed information menus with priority, the user cannot understand what occasions the user has accessed those menus in concretely.
And, according to the inventions described in the patent documents 2 and 4, in which the user is provided with information related to each route according to his/her moving history data, as well as the moving history data of other users, such history data is insufficient to identify why the user is moving on the route currently. Consequently, any of the inventions described in the above patent documents 1 to 4 cannot solve the problem that it cannot avoid to provide the user who is moving on a route with completely the same information regardless of the user""s moving purpose (going to go to work or enjoying driving his/her car leisurely).
Under such circumstances, it is an object of the present invention to provide a system and a method for providing the user of each mobile object with useful information matching with the user""s moving purpose, selected from information obtained beforehand in relation to each route having been used by the user, as well as to each user""s moving purpose.
In order to solve the above conventional problems, according to one aspect of the present invention, the information providing system to be employed for a mobile object comprises route type determining apparatus, provided information selecting unit for selecting information to be provided to the user according to the route type determined by the route type determining apparatus, and provided information presenting means for presenting information selected by the provided information selecting unit to the user.
According to another aspect of the present invention, the information providing system for a mobile object further includes starting/destination point determining unit. And, the route type determining apparatus determines the type of a route used by the user according to both starting and destination points determined by the starting/destination point determining unit, as well as the clock time at that time.
According to still another aspect of the present invention, the starting/destination point determining unit of the information providing system for a mobile object determines both starting and destination points through communication with the user and the route type determining apparatus determines a route type through communication with the user.